


(Let Me Stand) Next To Your Fire

by theclaravoyant



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: AOS S4, AOS Spec, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, UA
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-01
Updated: 2017-11-22
Packaged: 2018-08-18 20:36:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8175202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theclaravoyant/pseuds/theclaravoyant
Summary: When a mad science/magic investigation goes wrong, Jemma is affected. Terrified of her apparently destructive new powers, she isolates herself in the base's containment chambers. Fitz comes to see her, and to begin constructing a plan to help Jemma through it.Contains light 4x01/4x02 spoilers.





	1. Chapter 1

“Fitz,” Jemma whimpered, “don’t come in.”

Her trembling voice tugged at his heartstrings, and for a moment, he almost obeyed. But she’d been sitting here for hours, probably just like this - hugging her knees to her chest with her hands pressed to her eye sockets - the whole time. He couldn’t leave her like that; dangling, waiting for some inevitable catastrophe. He wasn’t going to stay away forever: he might as well stop staying away right now.

Fitz drew a deep breath and slid the door open. Jemma whimpered again, and flung herself across the bed, stuffing her face into the pillow. 

“I said _don’t come in,”_ she repeated. 

“I know.” Fitz tried to say it as gently as possible, to convey that he wasn’t blindly refusing her request. He hovered by the doorway, in case she became so distressed he had to leave. “I brought you some clothes, is all, and some things to freshen up. Thought it might help you feel better.” 

Jemma made a noncommittal grunt, more scared than anything else, of what might happen. If something went wrong, if she opened her eyes, and killed or blinded him for bringing her a fresh shirt – 

“I can leave it here if you like. Or on the bed. What would you prefer?”

When Jemma only replied with another terrified squeak, Fitz couldn’t help a sharp intake of breath. Jemma’s shoulders were shivering. She kept her face in the pillow but all she wanted to do was look up. Her instincts told her all the fear would go away, if only for a while, if she could just see his face. 

Except that’s not what she would see. It would be white fire. Destruction. A silent, visual scream.

She held her breath when she felt the mattress compress slightly. Fitz was holding his breath too, she realised, until he spoke.

“Hey,” he invited, “I dislocated my thumb. It’s back in now, but it still looks super gross. Wanna see?” 

Jemma snorted. She wanted to laugh like she usually would have, but it sounded closer to crying instead. A knot twisted in her chest. What if she could never open her eyes again, never see him again? What if she could never go into the lab again? Sure, there were plenty of blind scientists out there, but none of them, she was quite certain, had the destructive capabilities of a small radiation bomb. 

Fitz sighed, and put a hand on her back. It was the wrong hand, and didn’t quite sit properly. Probably his non-dislocated one. Still, she smiled. The contact was nice. As nerve-wracking as it was to have him this close to her, after so much destruction, she couldn’t find within herself the desire to pull away. And, wary of her anxieties, Fitz did not push for more. It was an uneasy compromise, but a somewhat pleasant one, comparatively comforting given the day they’d had. 

“Jemma, I’ve been thinking,” Fitz began again, more solemnly than before, “Once the radiation flushes out of your system, you’ll be fine. You’re not going to be stuck in here forever. You’re going to be okay.” 

“You don’t know that,” Simmons objected. “If that was normal radiation, I’d be dead. Something’s wrong with me.” 

“Jemma –“

“It is. And don’t try telling me I’m different and it’s okay, because it’s not. I’m – I’m terrified I’m going to burn you all to a crisp if I open my eyes and that’s not okay. It’s not. It’s wrong.” 

Distressed, her voice hitched and jumped with tears. 

“I’m…sorry you feel like that,” Fitz said after a moment. “But it’s going to be okay.”

He almost felt like crying himself, hearing her so panicked. He’d have lifted her into his arms and hugged her, except that staring directly at him in this state – even with her eyes closed – would probably stop her heart in sheer terror. Patience was torture, but he’d endure it for as long as she had to.

“We’re going to sort this out, Jemma,” he promised. “Even if it did change you. We’re going to get a handle on it, just like Daisy did. Just like Bruce Banner did, right? It doesn’t have to control you.” 

He felt her calm a little, and his own body began to relax. 

“It’s okay to be scared,” he added, because Jemma rarely gave her own fears license, “but it doesn’t have to control you.” 

Slowly, Jemma curled and uncurled, bringing her face out from under the pillow. She turned, and felt around for his hand that had been on her back. She followed it to his chest, and he could see her eyelids fluttering, insisting that she stare at his face. She pursed her lips in determination and screwed up her eyebrows, instead feeling for his other hand. He offered it to her, silent, and she felt the hot swelling and bruising. 

“Oh, you poor thing,” she murmured. 

“Me or the hand?” Fitz joked, and was rewarded with a momentary smile for his efforts, before a sliver of panic made Jemma jump, and jam the heels of her hands against her eye sockets again. 

“I- I’m sorry,” she stammered. “You should go.” 

“Okay.”

 _I’m sorry. I want to help. I love you. I’m scared too._ Fitz drew a deep breath. 

“One more thing,” he offered, reaching back to the pile of clothes he had brought in. It was a little difficult to do with one good hand, but he’d trained himself to do a lot of things one-handed, and his body remembered well. He picked up a pair of laboratory goggles he’s covered in black duct-tape, splaying out from the edges like wings as well to a mask of darkness for the wearer. It was scrappy, but effective – almost unnervingly so, when he’d tried it out himself. 

Gently, he brushed his good hand against Jemma’s cheek. She was staring straight at him, almost staring him in the face. Her fingers clawed at the sheets, heart racing.

“Fitz, I don’t think-“ 

The temptation to open her eyes was almost unbearable. It felt like her body was splintering. Like if she didn’t open her eyes right then, she was going to die. Something was coming for her and she didn’t know. Or perhaps this would be her last chance. Still, she resisted.

“Just a few more seconds,” Fitz promised, and slipped something cold and strange, slightly scratchy but not unpleasant, onto her face. She screwed up her nose and felt them move. Glasses?

“Now, they’re not going to stop any super-powerful laser beams or anything,” Fitz explained, “but they’re making everything black right now. Even if you open your eyes, you won’t be able to see me. You won’t see anything. Just blackness.” 

As much as it pained him to part with her face, she calmed as she turned away and curled up again. She put the pillow over her head for good measure, but there was no longer the desperation she’d had before. She could breathe easier. Now that she was no longer looking at him, the stress was easier to bear, and knowing that she could no longer see him – or anything – even if she wanted to, somehow made it easier to keep her eyes shut. Like she was missing out on less. Even like she was in less danger, somehow. 

“Now, personally,” Fitz continued, “I don’t think it’s going to happen again, at least not spontaneously, but…better safe than sorry, I guess. I’m working on another pair of these, made from a similar polymer as the walls of this place. Obviously we don’t _know_ if it’ll retain non-Inhuman powers but it’s our best bet.” 

“Thank you, Fitz,” Jemma murmured. “I know you’re doing your best.”

He put his hand on her back again. The warmth of her skin, her breathing, her slowly steadying heartbeat loosened his chest, but calmer though he was, his heart still ached at the thought of leaving her again so soon. 

“You know I’d sleep right out there in the pod if I could,” he promised.

“I know you would. But you shouldn’t, you should go.”

“I know.”

“If you go, I think I could sleep,” Jemma offered hopefully. Fitz smiled, sad to go, but touched to know he’d left her in a better state than he’d found her. 

“You do that,” he agreed. “I’ll bring you some food when you wake up, if you like.”

“That would be wonderful. Thank you.”

Fitz leant over, and lightly kissed Jemma’s exposed shoulder before pulling the blanked up over it, and leaving as unobtrusively as he could. He waited a while in the pod that served as an airlock to the chamber Jemma was now in. It took a long time, but eventually, the monitors gave vitals that represented sleep. The radiation levels were, disturbingly, not going down. Fitz made a note to get another iodine shot, just in case, but he couldn’t help thinking Jemma was right. It had contained itself in her, somehow; if he were to do a blood test on himself, it would probably identify nothing out of the ordinary.

He frowned down at the monitor for a while, thinking. Then he looked up, through the glass to where Jemma was finally sleeping after hours of painstaking alertness and care, petrified she could kill everyone she knew and loved in an instant. What a burden to bear. And all he could do to share in it was bring her clothes and food and make promises – and, he hoped, keep those promises. 

“We’re going to be okay,” he whispered to her, one more time, and then headed off to the lab to do what he could to make it true.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> back by the heartfelt request of a beloved fan & friend. I am happy to continue writing pieces in this 'verse as I believe I have found my direction for it. I hope you like it!
> 
> just a warning for some angst near the beginning of this chap, as Jemma is in for quite a shock to the system, but the second half is more positive I promise. no Tragedy Porn up in here

_“Trust me,”_ Fitz said, his voice crackling a little over the comms.  _“Everyone is perfectly safe. We’re behind two layers of polymer and radiation glass, just like you asked. Okay?”_

Jemma nodded. Then, realising he probably couldn’t see her from that far away, hoarsely whispered; “Yes.”

Fitz swallowed hard. His fingers twitched on the keyboard of the computer through which they were all watching her – standing small, scared and alone in the middle of her cell. The duct-tape glasses he had made for her lay abandoned on the bed. Prototypes for the new, ‘power-proof’ model were scattered across his desk. He tried not to think about them too much – tried to hope that they would not be necessary – but Jemma had not opened her eyes in three days out of sheer terror and that was a pessimism difficult to overcome.

Daisy put a hand on his shoulder, and squeezed the button to speak to Jemma.

“We’re with you,” she promised. “No matter what, okay?”

Behind them, Elena had a fist clenched around the crucifix at her neck. She hadn’t disclosed what exactly she was praying for and nobody had asked. Mack was quiet, as usual, but his shoulders were tense. May and Coulson stood close by each other, eyes fixed on the tiny Jemma on the screen with concern.

“Are you ready?” Fitz checked.

Jemma squared her shoulders. “Ready as I’ll ever be, I suppose. No use standing around all day, is there?”

She took a deep breath, and Fitz found himself doing the same. Across the crowd – across the whole base, it seemed – breath was held.

Then Jemma opened her eyes.

* * *

 

\--

_Black._

Jemma reached out her hands, feeling unsteady. Feeling like she’d just fallen into water. A little dizzy, disoriented, because she had her eyes open and nothing had changed. She looked around. Nothing but black.

“Fitz?” Her voice trembled as it left her throat.

_“Yeah?”_

The tension flooded out of her chest for a moment. She could have wept if she weren’t so wired.

 _“I’m here,”_  he said gently.

“What happened?”

 _“Nothing,”_  he explained.  _“No flash. No heat. Nothing dangerous at all. You’re fine.”_

“N- no,” she stammered, heart beginning to race again, throat beginning to close over. She tried to tell herself, remind herself where she was. She’d been in this room any number of times before. White walls. A desk. A large television screen. A vase of yellow daisies.

Not this.

Not black.

 _“Jem?”_  Daisy checked. “ _Are you okay?”_

_Nononononono._

She curled up, crouching down, huddling her knees to her chest until she felt the end of the bed against her back and used that for support instead, collapsing into the floor. She pressed her hands to her eyes – to protect herself, or to clear them, or just as a comforting habit after all this time? She didn’t know. She couldn’t decide. All her thoughts were scattered. All of a sudden she felt so unprepared for this. All her optimism and bargaining and reason splintered in the face of world-altering fear.

_What am I going to do?_

The door slid open and her heart clenched. Footsteps.

_Fitz?_

She looked up.

Black.

New disappointment, new fear. A whimper escaped her throat. The hot stinging feeling of tears on her cheeks was strange without the blurred vision to accompany it. The footsteps echoed in her ear; the shifting air pressed in as Fitz knelt down before her.

“Jemma?” he asked, his voice so beautifully, painfully clear in person, and bleeding with love and concern. “…Can you see me?”

She shook her head, over and over, as all the overwhelming emotion - everything she’d had too much time to ponder these last few days - crashed in on her like waves. The weight of her altered future. The knowledge of the things she might never see or do again. All of it, spinning out of control, like her life was a car somebody else was driving, and had crashed, and she couldn’t  _breathe_  and -

Jemma gasped and gasped, sobbing and hyperventilating and trying to speak all at the same time. As calmly as he could, Fitz enveloped her in his arms and cradled her against his chest, waiting for the panic to subside. He remembered the terror of first becoming aware of what had happened to him not so long ago; of wanting something, expecting something, and having it within reach but beyond control like some kind of sick joke. Like a nightmare. His stomach churned at the thought that Jemma had to endure it too, but he kept his breathing steady. She would make it through, just like he had; they just had to ride the rollercoaster out.

“We’re gonna be okay,” he reminded her. “We planned for this, remember?”

“I’m sorry,” she choked, hiccupping with sobs – “I didn’t want – I didn’t want to be scared. I wanted to be brave, like you – ‘n D- Daisy but I –“

Holding her tighter, hoping the physical pressure would stop her from spinning out mentally, Fitz rocked a little.

“Just breathe,” he reminded her. “It’s okay to be scared. It’s not your fault. But we’re all safe, okay? That’s the important thing. You’re not going to hurt us. It’s all uphill from here.”

Jemma nodded, trying to absorb it. Her chest unclenched a little with every reassurance. Her breathing began to steady, matching Fitz’s, and she thought of how far he’d come. If he could do it, maybe she could too.

Eventually, with a deep breath, she pulled back from him a little. She heard him hum quietly, and smiled to herself, envisioning the little frown of concern that would crumple his face. Tenderly, he touched her shoulders, her neck, her cheeks, and wiped her tears away with the pads of his thumbs. He let his hands linger there, until Jemma raised her own to touch them, hold them, and lower them down again. In this simple, quiet moment, she felt herself begin to steady.

“Well.” She rubbed his hands with her own, experiencing the texture, and realising just how much she’d missed their intimacy in these last few, long days. “What now?”

“That depends on you,” Fitz said. “I could try and make something - an implant or something – that could give you your sight back. But since we don’t understand why it’s gone…”

“You don’t know where to start,” Jemma finished. “That is something. The time and energy is another. And the surgeries. And – what if the radiation does something to it? Or leaks? Or what if my powers have something to do with it?”

“Powers?” Fitz frowned. “You have powers?”

“I assume so. Don’t you?”

“You didn’t radiation-bomb us just now, so I’m not sure what to think.”

“Well, maybe it’s like Daisy’s powers. Maybe it only happens when I’m feeling certain things. Maybe I’m recharging. I don’t know. But I’m not banking on it being a once-off.”

“That’s smart.”

“I do try.” Jemma smiled a tight-lipped smile, not feeling quite the same buzz of confidence she usually got with this sort of bantering praise, but glad for a little lightheartedness now that the worst – she hoped – was over.

“Knock-knock.”

Jemma’s smile widened at the sound of Daisy’s voice. Fitz helped her up – she was getting more used to feeling, rather than seeing, the movement of her tangle of limbs – and she walked forward with arms outstretched until Daisy filled them. They lingered in their embrace for a moment, like in so many near-death experiences before, until Daisy pulled back to offer Jemma something.

The gift felt odd in Jemma’s hands. Plastic, with holes in it. Something that could be plastic or glass. Small. Smooth surfaces. A few ridges where surfaces joined. Oh, hinges! And suddenly it made sense.

“Those are the latest glasses,” Fitz explained. “They should refract light, retain radiation, all that.”

“But if your eyes start hurting, tell someone,” Daisy warned. “Don’t pull a Daisy, okay? Skulls are a lot harder to fix than arms.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Jemma promised, though she was a little distracted, feeling her own face and trying to coordinate the ends of the glasses’ arms with her ears and hair. Laughing, she dodged it here and there before Daisy caught on and helped her slip them on more smoothly.

“I gotcha,” Daisy promised, fixing Jemma’s hair over the glasses. “Not the greatest fashion statement, but you make it work.”

“It’s just a protoype,” Fitz insisted, a little defensively. “I can give different styles a whirl once I’ve worked out what I can do with the materials.”

“They’re fantastic, Fitz,” Jemma interrupted, before Daisy could jibe him again. “I really appreciate it. I feel much safer now, and hard as it was… is… I’m glad we did this. I’m glad I know. Well, something, at least – there’s always plenty more that needs figuring out and muddling through.”

“Ah,” Daisy agreed, nudging her playfully, “but that’s the fun part!”

“Would you like to come and help?” Fitz invited. “Daisy’s set you up an office near the lab.”

“Also brought you this,” Daisy added. She tapped it on the ground so that Jemma could hear it, then passed it over; a leather handle - which felt a bit like a golf club, only lighter - and a long, thin titanium rod. Jemma swished it around a little, getting used to the feel of it, and heard it thwack lightly against Daisy’s cargo pants.

“Woah!” Daisy cried. “Hands and legs inside the vehicle, please.”

Obediently, Jemma dropped the tip of the cane to the ground and kept it there, swinging it lightly across the floor with one hand and the keeping the other interlocked with Fitz’s arm as Daisy led the way out and down the hall. It was the first time Jemma had ventured out of her room since she’d demanded she be locked in after the incident, and she was surprised to find that she could walk tall, even if what her cane was telling her didn’t make much sense yet.

She heard the sound of a door unlocking, and they slowed as Fitz and Daisy bundled her into a room. Her office. She smiled.

“The daisies are in here, aren’t they?”

She imagined that Fitz and Daisy smiled to each other in the moment of silence that passed, before Daisy launched into the tour. They went around her desk, a TV screen, a bookshelf –

“And here, this thing will read out to you what it sees. Check it out.”

Daisy pushed a round object, about the size of a cricket ball, into Jemma’s hand and eagerly held up a book cover. Jemma scanned it.

 _“The Biophysical Properties of North American Soils, by Jacob Lane,”_  read the friendly automated device. Jemma grinned, and Daisy held up another:

 _“Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, by J K Rowling,”_ read the device.

“Cool, huh?” Daisy pointed out. “I’ve also put your computer on text to speech. That one’s robot voice is super annoying but Fitz and I are working on it.”

Jemma shook her head, awed and humbled.

“This is fantastic,” she praised. “Honestly, it’s such a gift.”

“There’s also a private tea tray and a fridge in the corner,” Fitz explained. “I know I found… public displays of inelegance… really awkward at first, so if you’d rather eat in private, you can.”

“Oh, stop it!” Jemma waved her hand, choking up again. “You’re going to make me cry. Gosh, today has just been too much.”

“Our pleasure,” Daisy insisted.

“Can – sorry,” Jemma began again. “Can I have a moment?”

“Of course!” Fitz agreed, and slipped carefully free of her arm. “Call if you need us.”

Jemma agreed, and the door clicked closed as they left her to it. She felt her way over to the chair and sat down, overwhelmed in a whole new way. She straightened and pulled the chair in as best she could, and set about exploring her desktop setup, only to find that Daisy or Fitz had left a webpage open. As she listened, it started to read:

_[Once, there was a star...](https://www.ted.com/talks/wanda_diaz_merced_how_a_blind_astronomer_found_a_way_to_hear_the_stars/transcript) _


End file.
